Exclusive: first high-resolution close-up pictures of the stealth drone in Iran. With signs of belly landing.

Published on: December 8, 2011 at 11:19 PM

We got the first high-rez images of the stealth drone captured by Iran.

After reading my previous article about the RQ-170 seized by Iran (Breaking: Iran news agency releases first images of captured U.S. stealthy drone), “Jeff” a visitor of my site suggested where to download the first hi-resolution pictures of the almost intact “Beast of Kandahar”.

Images seems to confirm that the drone is real, of a desert-like color (quite different from the dark grey one of all the previous pictures) and above all, small scratches appear on the left wing, as if the stealthy drone crash landed on its belly, without extracting the landing gear, or maybe because the undercarriage collapsed due to hard landing.

Update: weird signs appear also on both wing roots as if they were damaged too. Someone suggesting it is putty and that proves the drone is just a 1:1 scale model.

Once again, stay tuned.

Image credit: via “Jeff” for TheAviationist.com

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David Cenciotti is a journalist based in Rome, Italy. He is the Founder and Editor of “The Aviationist”, one of the world’s most famous and read military aviation blogs. Since 1996, he has written for major worldwide magazines, including Air Forces Monthly, Combat Aircraft, and many others, covering aviation, defense, war, industry, intelligence, crime and cyberwar. He has reported from the U.S., Europe, Australia and Syria, and flown several combat planes with different air forces. He is a former 2nd Lt. of the Italian Air Force, a private pilot and a graduate in Computer Engineering. He has written five books and contributed to many more ones.
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